I definately agree. Check Nexus if you never did and only played skyrim without mods. The game becomes so much better with some of them and there's loads of new content too.
Check the top 20 mods and install some, you won't regret it, the quality is really high. And with the mod manager installing/upgrading/deleting a mod is very easy. No zip extracting or file moving etc, everything is handled automaticly. And all mods have readmes about how they work ingame.
On March 28 2013 21:46 rapture wrote: Could you recommend any usefull Mods for somebody that just purchased Skyrim?
First things first, go here and download the nexus mod manager. With it you can easily add/remove mods. Some mods require to be run by a custom exe file, learn how to install this here. I assume you have all the official dlcs, hearthfire, dawnguard and dragonborn. If not get them.
These mods I don't see myself playing ever without. I recommend all of them.
Then it's up to you to dig in and get whatever you like. Pro tip : search the mods by categories and sort the results out via endorsements. You will find all the great mods ez this way.
SkyUI is also something you should get without question. It changes the consolified inventory system into something that is designed for mouse + keyboard, which works a lot better, is less clunky, it is easier to find stuff, AND it looks better. The others the guy three above me mentioned are other things that don't really change a lot of the basics, but make the game better as a whole, and would also be things i'd recommend.
Afterwards, it depends on how much you want to change, and how much you want the original experience. I personally would recommend getting Requiem, but that one changes a lot of things gameplay wise, and i don't know if that is something you want to do on your first playthrough. Especially the removal of the level scaling is something a lot of people really want, but some don't like it because it results in you being restricted in where you can go since you can meet things that you are not able to fight yet (that does not happen in the base game)
A question for anyone running SkyRE... Every time I've tried enabling the combat module it's been an exercise in frustration. I run out of stamina instantly in combat and fighting more than one enemy seems impossible... once they get into melee I just die instantly under 500 power attacks in 2 seconds. I also thought that blocking was supposed to block most damage, but so far that hasn't been the case at all. Anyway I'm playing a thief/assassin with a longbow and a sword (atm) and while taking stuff out with the bow seems to be working alright, the melee is just a clusterfuck of blocking and attacking that I'm never sure even works. Is there a guide or something on how you're supposed to approach this combat?
Yea, playing a thief assassin style there won't serve you much in a brawl, as it should be. You need to get your stats and skills pretty high if you want to just go duke it out with your longsword vs 2 handed barbarian fighter types.
If you want to brawl, heavy armor, shield, pick stamina and health upgrades on level up (stamina mainly). Being low stamina character on SkyRE combat module will get you pummeled to the ground. I was getting 1 hit by normal bandit's arrows on adept difficulty when playing as a cloth character so yea, you need to give combat a bit more respect. Might be that I had the additional location damage mod thingie as well though.
Oh you might want to try out poisons big time for your weapons if your character isn't physically a mountain, dem poisons in SkyRE can be pretty badass and not that hard to find or make. Apply a dot poison on your blade or bow, make a hit and then dodge around till the baddie dies from it. I'm playing a poisoner thief currently with shortbow and dagger, haven't been able to actually backtab anyone to death yet, since I'm pretty much dead from a single power attack from anything :D but paralyze poisons, health poisons, arrow shots in the neck or head and so on. Makes a different approach to combat. Draugr are kinda bitch though.
Ok, I understand that it makes perfect sense for a dagger-wielding thief to get smashed by a berserker in a head-on fight, but doesn't this philosophy limit the gameplay pretty heavily? A lot of quests in Skyrim come to mind that involve taking on larger groups at once and I can't even imagine how I'm supposed to handle those with this mod. I've just been ambushed in Riften by 3 mercenaries (hired by -Guard, heh) at level 22 and literally the only way I could survive the engagement was to abuse the canal water and shoot them with my bow while swimming between ladders. After killing 2, I figured I'd man up and go beat up the final guy with my daggers, which resulted in me almost dying before managing to jump back into the water... It just feels silly and tbh exploiting AI just to progress isn't all that enjoyable. How does the "difficult combat" mod (the widely accepted alternative) stack up? Is it more reasonable for a stealth character?
On March 28 2013 21:46 rapture wrote: Could you recommend any usefull Mods for somebody that just purchased Skyrim?
First things first, go here and download the nexus mod manager. With it you can easily add/remove mods. Some mods require to be run by a custom exe file, learn how to install this here. I assume you have all the official dlcs, hearthfire, dawnguard and dragonborn. If not get them.
These mods I don't see myself playing ever without. I recommend all of them.
Then it's up to you to dig in and get whatever you like. Pro tip : search the mods by categories and sort the results out via endorsements. You will find all the great mods ez this way.
How is the auto-level-scaling in Skyrim? It was awful in Oblivion (you know, when every fucking highway brigand has a fucking daedric armor...), so many mods tried to patch it. Is it better in vanilla Skyrim, or would you still recommend some mod to have it right?
Yeah skyrim vanilla's way of handling mobs' levels is very good. But if you want there are mods that remove the leveling while balancing the mobs strength, so you will die almost 100% vs a vampire until you are 20-25lvl or have no problem with rats past 5-6lvl. And there's a mod that turns skyrim into gothic by allowing you to level your skill only by training, so there's a use for all the gold you get too/reason to get more.
Btw I would not recommend SkyRe for people that want to get the most out of modded skyrim. SkyRe is just a convenient tool with a great number of fixes and alterations into one single mod for those that can't be bothered spending their time searching. Individually though there are much better mods to use instead.
On April 12 2013 06:29 ryndaris wrote: Ok, I understand that it makes perfect sense for a dagger-wielding thief to get smashed by a berserker in a head-on fight, but doesn't this philosophy limit the gameplay pretty heavily? A lot of quests in Skyrim come to mind that involve taking on larger groups at once and I can't even imagine how I'm supposed to handle those with this mod. I've just been ambushed in Riften by 3 mercenaries (hired by -Guard, heh) at level 22 and literally the only way I could survive the engagement was to abuse the canal water and shoot them with my bow while swimming between ladders. After killing 2, I figured I'd man up and go beat up the final guy with my daggers, which resulted in me almost dying before managing to jump back into the water... It just feels silly and tbh exploiting AI just to progress isn't all that enjoyable. How does the "difficult combat" mod (the widely accepted alternative) stack up? Is it more reasonable for a stealth character?
Well you could have done what a thief would do in that situation: flee the scene. You don't need to murderize everything you know. And if you do have to get something killed and it forces a bad fight on you, run, hide, ambush.
Sneak attacks are still super deadly when used right and stealth is still bonkers crazy (broken tbh). You can stay hidden in a quite dark room in the open and enemies might walk right past you and never notice. Haven't had a fight so far I couldn't deal with as a stealthy shortbow dude. Poisons help if I can't ambush them from stealth or if there's multiple enemies. Paralyze or slow poison and you can kill near anything.
Requiem works very well for a stealth character. You can kill humans pretty easily by being stealthy, and they can also kill you pretty easily if you get caught. Arrows are especially deadly. Dealing with nonhumans is completely different and often needs a lot of preparations.
On March 28 2013 21:46 rapture wrote: Could you recommend any usefull Mods for somebody that just purchased Skyrim?
First things first, go here and download the nexus mod manager. With it you can easily add/remove mods. Some mods require to be run by a custom exe file, learn how to install this here. I assume you have all the official dlcs, hearthfire, dawnguard and dragonborn. If not get them.
These mods I don't see myself playing ever without. I recommend all of them.
Then it's up to you to dig in and get whatever you like. Pro tip : search the mods by categories and sort the results out via endorsements. You will find all the great mods ez this way.
Afaik Balanced Magic is no longer being updated and has some issues with parts of the mod not actually changing anything in the game. I personally recommend Mighty Magick; seems to scale pretty well, changes the perks to make more sense, and adds a lot of new spells.
Complete crafting overhaul and Smithing perks overhaul are very good mods but make sure you get Sharlikrans Compatibility versions to help them mix well with a lot of other useful mods like Better Sorting.
Weapons and Armor fixes is now included in the Unofficial Skyrim Patch which I also highly recommend. Fixes all kinds of annoying bugs all over the game.